As of 2016, self-regulation on the Internet has become stricter ever than before. Which means that a large number of commercial websites enforce their power without a government’s intervention. In other words, the commercial companies/organisations restrict Internet users’ rights that are so-called the free-use of contents.

One of the recent instances is that Facebook deleted the photo of the napalm girl (The Verge 2016). As a result, this has become an issue among Internet users (The Verge 2016). Everyone, who studied the modern history especially the Cold War, may recognise the Pulitzer Prize-winning photo ‘Napalm Girl’ taken by Associated Press (AP) photographer Nick Ut (AP 2016). This well-known photo shows a naked Vietnamese child Phan Thi Kim Phuc fleeing from a South Vietnamese Air Force bomber’s napalm attack (AP 2016). Besides, this image is the historic photo that represents the brutality of war.

According to the Facebook’s community standards (2016) in terms of nudity, this indicates:

“People sometimes share content containing nudity for reasons such as awareness campaigns or artistic projects. We restrict the display of nudity because…”

“We also restrict some images of female breasts if they include the nipple, but we always allow photos of women actively engaged in breastfeeding or showing breasts with post-mastectomy scarring.”

Definitely, Facebook worried about the violation of the community standards (2016) “Facebook restricts the display of nudity”. However, Facebook allows the photo of women breastfeeding as you can see on Facebook. But honestly, the Company did not allow the display of the Pulitzer Prize-winning photo. What an ironic situation. Are you serious, Facebook? That photo is the historic proof of the brutality of the Vietnam War that can be used for an educational purpose.

The guidelines regulated by Facebook allow people to share ‘good contents’, and prevent people to share ‘unfit contents’. However, this is very subjective. What kinds of contents can be classified either ‘good contents’ or ‘unfit contents’? And who can judge this criterion? Maybe Mark Zuckerberg?

I found an interesting news article which was about a goldfish. According to Hipsley (2008), it is widely known that “there is a popular belief that goldfish only have a three-second memory span and every lap of their fishbowl is like seeing the world for the first time”. Besides, a report published by Microsoft Canada (2015) indicates that the average human attention span is eight seconds while the average attention span of a goldfish is nine seconds.

The reason why I mentioned goldfish’s memory capacity is that I want to discuss one’s attention capacity. These days many people are using smartphone especially among those who were born between 1980 and later than that, who are so-called Generation Y and Z. Besides, smartphone and other electronic devices notifies endless notifications in real time. This can be one of reasons why we are not able to concentrate on a specific task. Metaphorically, Generation Y and Z are similar to goldfish in terms of attention capacity. According to this situation, getting-things-done (GTD) is becoming popular among those who want to increase their productivity. For instance, they listen to music for getting things done that is also known as concentration/focus music.

In order to do a Week 9’s assignment, I asked my girlfriend whether I could examine her attention capacity. And she agreed with my request, and she agreed with publishing examination results on my WordPress blog as well. Prior to the examination, I had designed a short task that would examine her attention capacity: I asked her to read an online article for ten minutes. And while she was reading the article, I examined her attention capacity. During the examination, I found out an interesting fact that she was not able to fully concentrate on reading the online article because of instant messenger/SNS (Facebook) notifications on her smartphone. After being alerted to the notifications, she opened an instant messenger/Facebook application, and she replied to her messenger/SNS friends. This is in contradiction to my attention capacity, as I can fully concentrate on a specific task.

Multitasking

According to the report published by Microsoft Canada (2015), this report argues that “social media can drain one’s resources, reducing the ability to allocate attention, connect with content on an emotional level, and process information”. It can be defined that this is somewhat similar to the result of the examination. It is known that mankind has higher intelligence than other creatures, however can it be justified that mankind is somewhat similar to a goldfish?

In Week 7, we learnt the use of public televisions, digital public signage and personal IT devices that were used to manage the pressures and opportunities of passing time in public areas. Besides, we learnt the types of public media including outdoor TVs, and Google Street View. And in this week, several tasks have been given which are: photographing someone who are using or watching media in a public place, explaining how I managed the ethics of this photography, and listing points that made public space ethnography effective.

Firstly, I asked one of my classmates taking BCM240. I asked her politely whether I was allowed to take a photo of her using/watching a medium. And she agreed with this photography. In order to satisfy the appropriateness of the photography including her privacy, I informed her that her face would not be taken and a photo would be used only for an academic purpose. And as you can see below, this was taken at a class room after finishing a lecture.

On the other hand, if I am asked for taking a photograph in a public area that contains an image of someone else I do not know, I would say no. Although an information sheet published by the Arts Law Centre of Australia (2016) guarantees that it is possible to take a photograph in public without asking his/her permission (there are a number of exceptions/limitations), I would not take it. According to the unspoken rules of our society that also are known as tacit knowledge, taking a photo of someone I do not know is inappropriate with even permission. And the second reason is that I am shy.

In terms of managing public space ethnography, there are some regulations and safeguards that can make public space ethnography effective/safe. According to the information sheet written by ALCA (2016), this shows that there are a number of regulations/safeguards. For instance, one of the regulations is “the use of surveillance devices and listening devices is regulated in most states and territories… the Surveillance Devices Act 1999 (Victoria) and Surveillance Devices Act 1998 (Western Australia) make it an offence to photograph a “private activity” without the consent of the subject” (ALCA 2016).

This week’s topic was quite interesting. Consequentially, I was able to learn the street photographer’s rights published by ALCA (2016). Previously, I did not know that such things were existed.

In this week, I would like to share one of my life stories which is about either a successful or failed attempt at going to a movie theatre. Prior to sharing either of them, I would like to define the meaning of the Hagerstrand’s three constraints. As these three constraints Hagerstrand stated in 1970 (cited in Hodge & Janelle 2013), these consist of three logical components which are: capability, coupling, and authority constraints.

Firstly, the capability constraints are imposed by physiological and biological abilities, and tools that an individual can command (Hodge & Janelle 2013). Which means that this refers to whether he/she can get to a location.

Secondly, the coupling constraints can be defined as limitations that when, where, and for how long an individual need to join with other people, and tools (Hodge & Janelle 2013). In other words, this refers to whether he/she can get to a location on time.

Lastly, the authority constraints can be defined as limitations on when activities can or cannot take place, and are imposed by external authorities (Hodge & Janelle 2013). In plain language, this refers to whether he/she is allowed to be at a specific location.

A typical cinema at a shopping mall; this file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

Either of the successful or failure attempt, I would like to share about my successful attempt at going to a cinema. I used to go the nearest movie theatre with my girlfriend. Prior to visiting the cinema, I have a habit that I used to check a movie schedule by using a mobile application, because I do not want to miss the movie or waste my valuable time waiting for the next show time. After checking the schedule, I used to use Uber when visiting the nearest shopping mall where the cinema is located. And of course, Uber is more reliable than public transportation in terms of saving times.

As of today, people do not need to worry about lack of physical and geographical accessibility to visit a movie theatre. With the advancement of information technologies, there are many different ways to see movies such as web-streaming services including YouTube, iTunes, Netflix, Hulu, and other numerous platforms (including IPTV). However, I still prefer a cinema. A movie I saw recently was ‘Train to Busan’. This movie is still available at theatres. This movie is the first Korean zombie apocalypse movie filmed by a Korean director. This was really awesome, and I recommend this movie if you have not seen yet.

ARPANET Logical Map – This work is in the public domain because it was published in the United States between 1923 and 1977 and without a copyright notice.

Since the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (abbreviated as ARPANET; the foundation of modern Internet) had been developed by the United States Department of Defense (Kaminow & Tingye 2002, pp. 28-29), the Internet has been advanced endlessly. With the rapid advancement of the communication platform, our daily lives have been radically changed. Amongst many countries on Earth, South Korea is one of the most wired countries in the world (Internet World Stats 2016). So to speak about our Internet penetration, there are 3 major Internet service providers in South Korea: Korea Telecom (KT), SK Telecom, and LG Telecom (PCMag 2016).

Network Diagram of Internet Devices – This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International License.

Let’s return to the household of the person who I spoke with in week 2. In the second week, I spoke with my mother about her memories of watching a television. And in this week (4th week), we are going to discuss what kind of Internet access is in my mother’s house, and how many devices are connected to the Internet. Firstly, there is a broadband and mobile network connection in the house. In terms of the number of devices connected to a broadband modem, the approximate number of the devices is four including a laptop, smartphone, Wi-Fi router, and IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) device.

As I said early, there are three major Internet providers in the Korea, including KT, SK, and LG (PCMag 2016). Amongst the broadband and mobile network service providers, my mother is using SK’s broadband service (FTTH), and KT’s mobile network service (3G and LTE network). By the way, South Korea has one of Internet service coverages with the highest densities in the world as well as the fastest Internet speed and bandwidth (PCMag 2016). Along with Singapore, Hong Kong HKSAR, and other similar countries, the Korea is offering the highest Internet service quality, and I am really satisfied with these facts.

Besides, the Internet has changed her way of life. Especially, with the dissemination of Wi-Fi router and smartphone, this set up a ubiquitous computing environment. Literally, my mother does not need to sit in front of a computer or television anymore. She just needs a smartphone to surf websites, or watch television shows, and this can be done without space constraints.

I am also using a smartphone, there is also a FTTH connection at a place where I am staying at this moment, and the total number of devices connected to the Internet is eight, including a game console, Wi-Fi router, IPTV device, tablet PC, laptops, and smartphones. I am not sure my Wi-Fi router is capable of these many wireless connections.

According to Fetterman (1998), a term ‘ethnography’ can be defined as the activity of documenting routine of people’s daily lives, and exploring cultural characteristics of group. Besides, Neuman (2007) defined ‘ethnography’ as “describing and understanding another way of life from the native point of view”. Then, what is the meaning of ‘collaborative’? According to Oxford Dictionaries written by Oxford University Press (2016), a term ‘collaborative’ means “something produced by or involving two or more parties working together”.

This image is in the public domain because its copyright has expired and its author is anonymous.

Ethnography is about to identify behaviour patterns, and to make readers understand the perspective of the native to the culture studied, and context, complexity, and politics of social processes. The processes of conducting ethnography is: firstly, identifying problem or topics of interest, fieldwork (data collection and analysis), participant observation, individuals and groups, analysis, and lastly presenting a report.

There are a number of the potential advantages and disadvantages of collaborative media ethnography. Firstly, let’s talk about the potential advantages. The most interesting point might be that creating a better understanding of others’ cultures would be one of the advantages of the term ‘collaborative media ethnography’. By setting the goals and objectives of studying the collaborative media ethnography, I believe that there might be the potential advantage that he/she can have a better understanding of others’ cultures that he/she never experienced before.

The second potential advantage of the collaborative media ethnography would be the acquisition of in-depth understanding of a culture among people. By conducting the collaborative media ethnography, it is expected that extensive knowledge about others’ cultures might be gained via detailed, vailed, and correct interpretations. Besides, by doing the collaborative media ethnography, this would give an opportunity to people and their cultures to represent people’s views of cultural knowledge that might not be heard before.

On the other hand, there are also a number of potential disadvantages of the collaborative media ethnography. The first potential challenge would be that the media ethnography might require additional time, efforts, and costs when this is compared to quantitative research. Which means qualitative research requires more resources than the quantitative research. Furthermore, findings and results are not generalizable, as sample sizes are small and limited. Another potential challenges would be that one of participants might not be neutralized, and this can result in affecting other participants, and results and findings.

Without any intention, we subconsciously do this type of experiment every day. For instance, we see what people wear, eat, do, and talk on crowded street. Thus, it can be defined that we all can be researchers, regardless of goals and objectives of a study. However, this is somewhat complexed and advanced in terms of academic and professional experiment.